Variations on a Wooden Spoon
By Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo
I spoon feed you sweetness
when you’re weak & overworked.
I don’t mind as long as you spoon
me in the soft glow of dawn,
yellow light on the skin of dreams.
Skin to skin is how I’m nourished,
how bones & heart grow strong.
Let me grip your long, hard handle
& lead you to my mouth like a plane
or train. No, let you come all man.
Let the dark tip of you soak in
steaming parts of me. Let it stir & stay
so long we swell & warp. Simply put,
let us fit into the other & never starve.
Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo is the daughter of Mexican immigrants and the author of Posada: Offerings of Witness and Refuge (Sundress Publications 2016). A former Steinbeck Fellow, Poets & Writers California Writers Exchange winner, and Barbara Deming Memorial Fund grantee, she’s received residencies from Hedgebrook, Ragdale, National Parks Arts Foundation, and Poetry Foundation. She has work published in Acentos Review, CALYX, crazyhorse, and [PANK]. Most recently her poem, “Battlegrounds,” was featured at The Academy of American Poets, Poem-A-Day. She is a member of Miresa Collective and director of Women Who Submit.